4 ms·

Most Ordinary Americans in 2016 Are Richer Than Was John D. Rockefeller in 1916

24 points by tokenadult 10y ago

forgotpwtomain 10y ago
The entire argument (lackthereof) is summed up in this conclusion: > Honestly, I wouldn’t be remotely tempted to quit the 2016 me so that I could be a one-billion-dollar-richer me in 1916. This fact means that, by 1916 standards, I am today more than a billionaire. For reasons such as this one: > Your telephone was attached to a wall. You could not use it to Skype. In other words there is no argument, by 'most ordinary americans' the author means: 'I am an ordinary American' and 'I wouldn't exchange my current life with a 1916 billionaire' -- which has nothing at all to do with 'wealth' nor with 'most ordinary americans'. edit: I don't see why this is down-voted, if you found some substance in this article that I didn't please feel free to make these points.
- Randgalt 10y ago
  Wealth is not the number of pieces of green paper in your pocket. It's the things you have and what you can do with those things. I would much rather be a lower middle class person in America today than King Henry hundreds of years ago.
  - forgotpwtomain 10y ago
    > Wealth is not the number of pieces of green paper in your pocket. It's the things you have and what you can do with those things. While wealth can also be your loved ones, your personal relationships, your experience and memories, the nature and culture of the land etc. As long as we are talking about economics and standards of living this should be defined in a way for which statistically significant numbers can be obtained e.g. the relative purchasing power, or relative employable labor relative to a time. (note that none of these are provided.) Yes, you couldn't 'Skype' in 1916 but I also can't employ Leonardo to draw paintings for a modestly large income as I could in the 16th century. You can't pull historical details out of their centuries and call that a worthwhile comparison because there is no equivalent. A subjective "it's the worst poverty because I'd have to use a rotary phone in 1916" can be your opinion sure, as is "it's poverty to lose my experiences and the significant people in my life to be rich in 1916" - but neither of those do anything to support the title which states: > Most Ordinary Americans in 2016 Are Richer Than Was John D. Rockefeller in 1916 Since the use of the generic 'most ordinary Americans' indeed requires the use a broadly applicable and numerically supportable definition of wealth (if one is to make the argument) rather than a personal one. I would have no objections if the title was "I an ordinary American, am richer today than John D. Rockefeller was in 1916" -- but that's clearly not what it says.
    - Natsu 10y ago
      > Wealth can also be your loved ones, your personal relationships, your experience and memories etc. Yes, but I wouldn't see any reason those should be different in the past than now, so we can compare only the difference in material goods. I'd certainly rather be an average person in this day and age than an average person in the stone age and I think most people would as well if they understood what it entailed.
      - forgotpwtomain 10y ago
        > I'd certainly rather be an average person in this day and age than an average person in the stone age and I think most people would as well if they understood what it entailed. As would I, but you simply have no basis to expand this claim into "most people would rather be Joe the Plumber than Augustus" which is what the article author is attempting to do with a hodge-podge of anecdotal rhetoric.
        Natsu 10y ago
        I don't think I could live where I do without utter misery if it weren't for temperature-controlled housing, so at least personally, I'd rather be able to live in comfort as today than to be a king from ages past. Perhaps some would be attracted by, say, the authority of ancient rulers. But I'd much rather live comfortably in the modern age than claiming imperium sine fine, ordering men to die in the Colosseum, waging war against the Gauls, having a salad bear my name or whatever exactly it is about being Caesar that's supposed to be attractive.
        forgotpwtomain 10y ago
        > I don't think I could live where I do without utter misery if it weren't for temperature-controlled housing I doubt you would feel this way if you'd never heard of temperature controlled housing - that aside. > Perhaps some would be attracted by, say, the authority of ancient rulers. But I'd much rather live comfortably in the modern age than claiming imperium sine fine, ordering men to die in the Colosseum, waging war against the Gauls, having a salad bear my name or whatever exactly it is about being Caesar that's supposed to be attractive. I'm not at all disputing your particular preference, or mine, or the author's of the article, if you re-read my past comments the argument is the same: the particular preference for modern day-convenience of a single individual over say vast wealth/power != 'most ordinary Americans are richer than J.D. Rockefeller'. Now maybe most ordinary Americans really don't care for the same things you don't care for, maybe for them skype calls and modern health-care (even with the ridiculous US medical bills) is preferable to Rockefeller style wealth; but such a point should be supported with data, not "I think it's preferable so most Americans must also think so." This is terribly shoddy writing with no material (non-subjective) facts provided to support the argument and we should expect better on HN (whether we happen to subjectively nod to the opinion or not is really beside the point).
- ghaff 10y ago
  The article gave quite a few reasons why, such as health care, to support his argument.
ajdlinux 10y ago
Most ordinary Americans in 2016 don't have the same level of power and influence - which many people value in and of itself - as Rockefeller did in 1916.
- Natsu 10y ago
  Influence is relative though. It's the difference between, say, being a superdelegate and an ordinary voter. If everyone only has the equal share, nobody really has meaningful influence, but things are more fair. So in some sense, the more fair the influence is, the less any particular person has of it.
- ghaff 10y ago
  That's really the sole counterargument. That, in spite of likely dying younger and being less comfortable, information starved, etc. etc. in many ways, being a powerful person would trump all that. And for some it probably would.
matt_wulfeck 10y ago
I'm not sure I buy the argument but I do always appreciate being reminded about our modern day conveniences. Sure life is incrementally better now, but isn't wealth truly about power and luxury as much as it is about convenience? Rockefeller was extremely influential. I do like my iPhone and accurate quartz crystal clocks, but he was definitely "richer".
Aloha 10y ago
The article is lacking in substance - but has an interesting core argument - "Americans in 2016, live much better than even the wealthiest people did in 1916" which is true - while we may have problems, and our economy might be broken in certain ways, we are light years ahead on a pure technological level than we were in 1916. From the influence angle, even with the pervasive power of money, even the very very rich today are not as powerful and influential as they were a century ago.
- andrewprock 10y ago
  I'm not sure that being able to watch "The Kardashians" on my iPhone while stuck in commuter traffic really counts as "living much better" than Rockefeller.
andrewprock 10y ago
It appears that the author is not aware of what money or inflation is. In 1916, Rockefeller was worth $1 Billion before adjusting for inflation. Methinks there is some banana-peel smoking going on in there somewhere.
- afsina 10y ago
  Yet, his main argument was not really about it.
  - andrewprock 10y ago
    Hence the banana-peels. If you're going to make an argument about people being richer and poorer, without discussing money, wealth, or inflation, you're doing everyone a disservice.
    - afsina 10y ago
      Actually, my point was, the amount of money was not the point of the article, but being the richest man yet having a less comfortable life was.
      - andrewprock 10y ago
        Ah, so the title of the essay was click-bait. Clever.
        deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
  - petecox 10y ago
    those poor extra-ordinary Americans, the Amish, who are leading similar lives to their ancestors 100 years ago, free from the burdens of 21st century technology... Richer but not necessarily more contented.
    - 10y ago
SocksCanClose 10y ago
Dammit -- free markets and new technology do it again! Not the best written piece in the world, nor the most tightly argued, but the underlying facts do certainly get at a certain truth: that things get better. For everybody. Bread, for example (the production of which used to consume the vast majority of human labor for many thousands of years). What was once an 80-hour-a-week-job (growing wheat, turning it into bread), can how be had for $.99 at a corner store (or the equivalent of about ten minutes' work at minimum wage. The second argument being, science.
- andrewprock 10y ago
  Things are certainly better for the middle class. Making the non-argument that things are better today for the middle class than they were for Rockefeller is nonsense.
- petecox 10y ago
  I tasted American 'bread' once. :) $.99 bread might possibly be a regression, flavour-wise. You do craft some mighty fine bagels though!
themgt 10y ago
This sort of capitalist meme badly if not intentionally misunderstands human nature. Yes, being able to afford dental care and fly around the world is terrific. But John D. Rockefeller was arguably the wealthiest American to ever live. You simply cannot quantitatively compare the ability to afford a $150 SouthWest economy-class flight and an air-conditioned hotel room at DisneyWorld to running a globe-spanning empire and building a philanthropic legacy that will last for hundreds of years. And this is not just some angels-on-head-of-pin debate, it's intimately intertwined with why inequality is so destructive and why classical economics has such a hard time dealing with it. Subjectively, each person's relative economic position is at least as important as their absolute position.
- zone411 10y ago
  The article doesn't claim that you are more powerful in the present, only that you'd be richer. Bringing up legacy and power that you would have had in the past does not work because by definition these things are only available to a few, so equality would not make them available to an average modern person. I think it would be more correct to talk about the envy.
- mizzao 10y ago
  > Subjectively, each person's relative economic position is at least as important as their absolute position. That subjective need to be "better" than your neighbor is part of the reason we are all less happy even though we have much more than ever in absolute terms. I don't even think it's a "capitalist meme", in some sense it is a core tenet (and at times a major problem) with capitalism. Bob Frank wrote a great book about this: http://www.amazon.com/Darwin-Economy-Liberty-Competition-Common/dp/0691153191 http://www.amazon.com/Darwin-Economy-Liberty-Competition-Com...
AlisdairO 10y ago
Humans fundamentally judge their situation relative to everyone else. It's one of the (many) arguments for reducing income inequality. People don't get hugely happier just because everyone's technological situation has improved - that's just the new norm. I suspect most people would be happier as one of the most extraordinarily wealthy, admired, and free people of a given time than they would as a (relatively) struggling nobody in a later age. The fact that your car breaks down somewhat often is probably less likely to bother you when you know that it's the best there is.
rgbrenner 10y ago
The author is trying really hard to trivialize inequality. First, comparing Rockefeller with $1B.. except he was worth what would be $340B in todays dollars. So first, he lowers the topline of the comparison. He says a letter overnight is impossible.. even though the telegraph existed for over 70 years at that point. Then he throws in some more trivial inconveniences: phones being attached to the wall. Then he adds in a few lies like being unable to get foreign food in NY in 1916. Hey guess what? NY had plenty of immigration in 1900, and Italian, German, Jewish, Chinese and Eastern European food was easily found: http://leitesculinaria.com/10348/writings-dining-through-the-decades-american-food-history.html http://leitesculinaria.com/10348/writings-dining-through-the... And while many of the points are true.. like it taking days to travel to Europe.. he forgets that as a billionaire, you can send people on your behalf, and they can telegraph information back to you from Europe. You, as a billionaire, never needs to make that trip. And if you're really worried about your limo breaking down.. as a billionaire, why not just have a few dozen follow you around, just in case? (Edit: also there were horse drawn and electric taxis operating in NY since the 1890s.. and even if he didn't want to take a taxi, it would still be useful for sending someone to notify whoever that he would be late for the meeting (something he pretends can only be done with a phone, and therefore impossible in 1916.)) He spends no time thinking about how he would actually utilize the resources of Rockefeller in 1916.. but would trade it all for a phone that isn't attached to the wall. Sure.
- zone411 10y ago
  >>>First, comparing Rockefeller with $1B.. except he was worth what would be $340B in todays dollars. So first, he lowers the topline of the comparison. Does $1 billion vs $340 billion mean even a small improvement in the quality of life in 1916? I doubt it. >>>He says a letter overnight is impossible.. even though the telegraph existed for over 70 years at that point. True about the telegraph but you ignored the part about the packages. >>>Then he adds in a few lies like being unable to get foreign food in NY in 1916. Hey guess what? NY had plenty of immigration in 1900, and Italian, German, Jewish, Chinese and Eastern European food was easily found How about Thai? Japanese? Turkish? Colombian? Vegetarian? Cocktails? >>>like it taking days to travel to Europe.. he forgets that as a billionaire, you can send people on your behalf That's only when not traveling for pleasure. >>>And if you're really worried about your limo breaking down.. as a billionaire, why not just have a few dozen follow you around, just in case? Good point.

24 points by tokenadult 10y ago

The entire argument (lackthereof) is summed up in this conclusion: > Honestly, I wouldn’t be remotely tempted to quit the 2016 me so that I could be a one-billion-dollar-richer me in 1916. This fact means that, by 1916 standards, I am today more than a billionaire. For reasons such as this one: > Your telephone was attached to a wall. You could not use it to Skype. In other words there is no argument, by 'most ordinary americans' the author means: 'I am an ordinary American' and 'I wouldn't exchange my current life with a 1916 billionaire' -- which has nothing at all to do with 'wealth' nor with 'most ordinary americans'. edit: I don't see why this is down-voted, if you found some substance in this article that I didn't please feel free to make these points.

Randgalt 10y ago
Wealth is not the number of pieces of green paper in your pocket. It's the things you have and what you can do with those things. I would much rather be a lower middle class person in America today than King Henry hundreds of years ago.
- forgotpwtomain 10y ago
  > Wealth is not the number of pieces of green paper in your pocket. It's the things you have and what you can do with those things. While wealth can also be your loved ones, your personal relationships, your experience and memories, the nature and culture of the land etc. As long as we are talking about economics and standards of living this should be defined in a way for which statistically significant numbers can be obtained e.g. the relative purchasing power, or relative employable labor relative to a time. (note that none of these are provided.) Yes, you couldn't 'Skype' in 1916 but I also can't employ Leonardo to draw paintings for a modestly large income as I could in the 16th century. You can't pull historical details out of their centuries and call that a worthwhile comparison because there is no equivalent. A subjective "it's the worst poverty because I'd have to use a rotary phone in 1916" can be your opinion sure, as is "it's poverty to lose my experiences and the significant people in my life to be rich in 1916" - but neither of those do anything to support the title which states: > Most Ordinary Americans in 2016 Are Richer Than Was John D. Rockefeller in 1916 Since the use of the generic 'most ordinary Americans' indeed requires the use a broadly applicable and numerically supportable definition of wealth (if one is to make the argument) rather than a personal one. I would have no objections if the title was "I an ordinary American, am richer today than John D. Rockefeller was in 1916" -- but that's clearly not what it says.
  - Natsu 10y ago
    > Wealth can also be your loved ones, your personal relationships, your experience and memories etc. Yes, but I wouldn't see any reason those should be different in the past than now, so we can compare only the difference in material goods. I'd certainly rather be an average person in this day and age than an average person in the stone age and I think most people would as well if they understood what it entailed.
    - forgotpwtomain 10y ago
      > I'd certainly rather be an average person in this day and age than an average person in the stone age and I think most people would as well if they understood what it entailed. As would I, but you simply have no basis to expand this claim into "most people would rather be Joe the Plumber than Augustus" which is what the article author is attempting to do with a hodge-podge of anecdotal rhetoric.
      - Natsu 10y ago
        I don't think I could live where I do without utter misery if it weren't for temperature-controlled housing, so at least personally, I'd rather be able to live in comfort as today than to be a king from ages past. Perhaps some would be attracted by, say, the authority of ancient rulers. But I'd much rather live comfortably in the modern age than claiming imperium sine fine, ordering men to die in the Colosseum, waging war against the Gauls, having a salad bear my name or whatever exactly it is about being Caesar that's supposed to be attractive.
        forgotpwtomain 10y ago
        > I don't think I could live where I do without utter misery if it weren't for temperature-controlled housing I doubt you would feel this way if you'd never heard of temperature controlled housing - that aside. > Perhaps some would be attracted by, say, the authority of ancient rulers. But I'd much rather live comfortably in the modern age than claiming imperium sine fine, ordering men to die in the Colosseum, waging war against the Gauls, having a salad bear my name or whatever exactly it is about being Caesar that's supposed to be attractive. I'm not at all disputing your particular preference, or mine, or the author's of the article, if you re-read my past comments the argument is the same: the particular preference for modern day-convenience of a single individual over say vast wealth/power != 'most ordinary Americans are richer than J.D. Rockefeller'. Now maybe most ordinary Americans really don't care for the same things you don't care for, maybe for them skype calls and modern health-care (even with the ridiculous US medical bills) is preferable to Rockefeller style wealth; but such a point should be supported with data, not "I think it's preferable so most Americans must also think so." This is terribly shoddy writing with no material (non-subjective) facts provided to support the argument and we should expect better on HN (whether we happen to subjectively nod to the opinion or not is really beside the point).
ghaff 10y ago
The article gave quite a few reasons why, such as health care, to support his argument.

ajdlinux 10y ago

Most ordinary Americans in 2016 don't have the same level of power and influence - which many people value in and of itself - as Rockefeller did in 1916.

Natsu 10y ago
Influence is relative though. It's the difference between, say, being a superdelegate and an ordinary voter. If everyone only has the equal share, nobody really has meaningful influence, but things are more fair. So in some sense, the more fair the influence is, the less any particular person has of it.
ghaff 10y ago
That's really the sole counterargument. That, in spite of likely dying younger and being less comfortable, information starved, etc. etc. in many ways, being a powerful person would trump all that. And for some it probably would.

matt_wulfeck 10y ago

I'm not sure I buy the argument but I do always appreciate being reminded about our modern day conveniences. Sure life is incrementally better now, but isn't wealth truly about power and luxury as much as it is about convenience? Rockefeller was extremely influential. I do like my iPhone and accurate quartz crystal clocks, but he was definitely "richer".

Aloha 10y ago

The article is lacking in substance - but has an interesting core argument - "Americans in 2016, live much better than even the wealthiest people did in 1916" which is true - while we may have problems, and our economy might be broken in certain ways, we are light years ahead on a pure technological level than we were in 1916. From the influence angle, even with the pervasive power of money, even the very very rich today are not as powerful and influential as they were a century ago.

andrewprock 10y ago
I'm not sure that being able to watch "The Kardashians" on my iPhone while stuck in commuter traffic really counts as "living much better" than Rockefeller.

andrewprock 10y ago

It appears that the author is not aware of what money or inflation is. In 1916, Rockefeller was worth $1 Billion before adjusting for inflation. Methinks there is some banana-peel smoking going on in there somewhere.

afsina 10y ago
Yet, his main argument was not really about it.
- andrewprock 10y ago
  Hence the banana-peels. If you're going to make an argument about people being richer and poorer, without discussing money, wealth, or inflation, you're doing everyone a disservice.
  - afsina 10y ago
    Actually, my point was, the amount of money was not the point of the article, but being the richest man yet having a less comfortable life was.
    - andrewprock 10y ago
      Ah, so the title of the essay was click-bait. Clever.
      - deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
- petecox 10y ago
  those poor extra-ordinary Americans, the Amish, who are leading similar lives to their ancestors 100 years ago, free from the burdens of 21st century technology... Richer but not necessarily more contented.
  - 10y ago

SocksCanClose 10y ago

Dammit -- free markets and new technology do it again! Not the best written piece in the world, nor the most tightly argued, but the underlying facts do certainly get at a certain truth: that things get better. For everybody. Bread, for example (the production of which used to consume the vast majority of human labor for many thousands of years). What was once an 80-hour-a-week-job (growing wheat, turning it into bread), can how be had for $.99 at a corner store (or the equivalent of about ten minutes' work at minimum wage. The second argument being, science.

andrewprock 10y ago
Things are certainly better for the middle class. Making the non-argument that things are better today for the middle class than they were for Rockefeller is nonsense.
petecox 10y ago
I tasted American 'bread' once. :) $.99 bread might possibly be a regression, flavour-wise. You do craft some mighty fine bagels though!

themgt 10y ago

This sort of capitalist meme badly if not intentionally misunderstands human nature. Yes, being able to afford dental care and fly around the world is terrific. But John D. Rockefeller was arguably the wealthiest American to ever live. You simply cannot quantitatively compare the ability to afford a $150 SouthWest economy-class flight and an air-conditioned hotel room at DisneyWorld to running a globe-spanning empire and building a philanthropic legacy that will last for hundreds of years. And this is not just some angels-on-head-of-pin debate, it's intimately intertwined with why inequality is so destructive and why classical economics has such a hard time dealing with it. Subjectively, each person's relative economic position is at least as important as their absolute position.

zone411 10y ago
The article doesn't claim that you are more powerful in the present, only that you'd be richer. Bringing up legacy and power that you would have had in the past does not work because by definition these things are only available to a few, so equality would not make them available to an average modern person. I think it would be more correct to talk about the envy.
mizzao 10y ago
> Subjectively, each person's relative economic position is at least as important as their absolute position. That subjective need to be "better" than your neighbor is part of the reason we are all less happy even though we have much more than ever in absolute terms. I don't even think it's a "capitalist meme", in some sense it is a core tenet (and at times a major problem) with capitalism. Bob Frank wrote a great book about this: http://www.amazon.com/Darwin-Economy-Liberty-Competition-Common/dp/0691153191 http://www.amazon.com/Darwin-Economy-Liberty-Competition-Com...

AlisdairO 10y ago

Humans fundamentally judge their situation relative to everyone else. It's one of the (many) arguments for reducing income inequality. People don't get hugely happier just because everyone's technological situation has improved - that's just the new norm. I suspect most people would be happier as one of the most extraordinarily wealthy, admired, and free people of a given time than they would as a (relatively) struggling nobody in a later age. The fact that your car breaks down somewhat often is probably less likely to bother you when you know that it's the best there is.

rgbrenner 10y ago

The author is trying really hard to trivialize inequality. First, comparing Rockefeller with $1B.. except he was worth what would be $340B in todays dollars. So first, he lowers the topline of the comparison. He says a letter overnight is impossible.. even though the telegraph existed for over 70 years at that point. Then he throws in some more trivial inconveniences: phones being attached to the wall. Then he adds in a few lies like being unable to get foreign food in NY in 1916. Hey guess what? NY had plenty of immigration in 1900, and Italian, German, Jewish, Chinese and Eastern European food was easily found: http://leitesculinaria.com/10348/writings-dining-through-the-decades-american-food-history.html http://leitesculinaria.com/10348/writings-dining-through-the... And while many of the points are true.. like it taking days to travel to Europe.. he forgets that as a billionaire, you can send people on your behalf, and they can telegraph information back to you from Europe. You, as a billionaire, never needs to make that trip. And if you're really worried about your limo breaking down.. as a billionaire, why not just have a few dozen follow you around, just in case? (Edit: also there were horse drawn and electric taxis operating in NY since the 1890s.. and even if he didn't want to take a taxi, it would still be useful for sending someone to notify whoever that he would be late for the meeting (something he pretends can only be done with a phone, and therefore impossible in 1916.)) He spends no time thinking about how he would actually utilize the resources of Rockefeller in 1916.. but would trade it all for a phone that isn't attached to the wall. Sure.

zone411 10y ago
>>>First, comparing Rockefeller with $1B.. except he was worth what would be $340B in todays dollars. So first, he lowers the topline of the comparison. Does $1 billion vs $340 billion mean even a small improvement in the quality of life in 1916? I doubt it. >>>He says a letter overnight is impossible.. even though the telegraph existed for over 70 years at that point. True about the telegraph but you ignored the part about the packages. >>>Then he adds in a few lies like being unable to get foreign food in NY in 1916. Hey guess what? NY had plenty of immigration in 1900, and Italian, German, Jewish, Chinese and Eastern European food was easily found How about Thai? Japanese? Turkish? Colombian? Vegetarian? Cocktails? >>>like it taking days to travel to Europe.. he forgets that as a billionaire, you can send people on your behalf That's only when not traveling for pleasure. >>>And if you're really worried about your limo breaking down.. as a billionaire, why not just have a few dozen follow you around, just in case? Good point.